MUSKEGON, MI – The clock continues to tick away on the life of the 65-year-old B.C. Cobb Generating Plant on Muskegon Lake.

Consumers Energy's B.C. Cobb Generating Plant has been a fixture at the east end of Muskegon Lake since 1946.Chronicle file photo

While in Norton Shores, Consumers Energy President and CEO John Russell reiterated late last week that the public utility still has plans to “mothball” the coal-fired power plant at “the beginning of 2015 or beyond.”

“It is a great plant but the environmental regulations are changing,” Russell told MLive and The Muskegon Chronicle while at the dedication of the company’s new Muskegon-area service center in Norton Shores.

Russell explained that little has changed since the Jackson-based utility announced in December 2011 that the plant built in 1948 on the mouth of the Muskegon River where it empties into Muskegon Lake would cease operations in 2015. Federal Clean Air Act regulations on the amount of particulates, nitrogen dioxide and mercury stiffen for coal-power plants in 2015.

Consumers Energy has decided to direct pollution control devices to newer, larger power plants like the J.H. Campbell plant in Port Sheldon, between Grand Haven and Holland. B.C. Cobb was among seven of the company’s smaller coal-generating plants named at the end of 2011 to be closed.

B.C. Cobb once had five generating units but only Units 4 and 5 remain coal-powered today, capable of generating 320 megawatts of electricity, which would power a community of about 200,000 people. Units 1, 2 and 3 were converted to natural gas in the early 1990s but remain laid up today because their power is not needed in the current Michigan electrical market, company officials say.

Consumers Energy’s expected move to close B.C. Cobb, which employs 116 people, is a significant blow to the Muskegon community. The plant is Muskegon County’s largest taxpayer, although its value diminished to $134.5 million in 2012 for taxing purposes under an agreement with the city of Muskegon and the company.

The current tax assessment of the plant is 9.6 percent of the entire city of Muskegon’s tax base and 1.5 percent of the entire county’s.

With the 2012 settlement, Muskegon City Manager Bryon Mazade said the city and the utility have no outstanding property tax issues. Future property tax assessments of the B.C. Cobb property will be determined annually in the years to come, he said.

The B.C. Cobb plant is also significant for its location on 300-acres of prime Muskegon Lake shoreline. Besides the electrical generation and distribution infrastructure associated with the plant, B.C. Cobb has a new deep-water dock built in 2008 for $11 million to accommodate the huge 1,000-foot freighters that deliver coal to the plant.

John Russell

“The key is that it is such a useful piece of property for Muskegon and all of Michigan,” Russell said of the Cobb site. “We continue to work with the community to determine the most effective use of the site going forward.”

Consumers Energy paid for a study of the port development potential of the B.C. Cobb property in conjunction with Muskegon Area First, the economic development agency. Consultants Rockford-Berge of Grand Rapids – an international consortium of Rockford Construction Co. and Spanish transportation company Berge – studied the future use of the Cobb’s 1,800-foot dock in 2012.

“Certainly we want to work with Consumers Energy, Muskegon Area First and Rockford-Berge to reach the highest and best use for the property in the future,” Mazade said of the city of Muskegon. “We have been told of the mothballing of the plant in 2015 and are looking towards that in terms of our financial picture. It’s on our minds.”

As Consumers Energy works through the regulatory issues facing the closure of a generating power plant in Michigan, Russell said the company and the community have time to work on future plans for the property.

“We are just at the beginning stages of the process,” Russell said of future planning for Muskegon Lake property.